The Russo Brothers Will Reveal ‘Avengers 4’ Title When They’re Good and Ready, Darn It

The title of Avengers 4 has remained a mystery for years, and since the Russo brothers have claimed that the title, when it’s revealed, will be a pretty huge spoiler for the events in Avengers: Infinity War, it’s all the more intriguing. The Russos say they can’t reveal what it is yet, and it sounds like they’re going to sit on it until most people have had enough time to see Infinity War this summer.

Speaking with MTV’s Happy Sad Confused podcast during Sundance, the Russos discussed the possibility that they’ve been filming decoy scenes to throw fans off the scent, and when the heck we can expect to find out what Avengers 4 is going to be called. Joe Russo said they’re going to let us have time to “absorb” what happens in Infinity War before they give us any more information.

It is certainly part of the concept of the title is that it’s advancing the narrative. So we’re gonna sit on that until we feel the time is right and when people have absorbed the first movie enough.

Unless it’s called something like AVENGERS 4: ADDRESSING THE SHOCKING DEATHS OF SIX SIGNIFICANT CHARACTERS IN AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR, I can’t really see the title spoiling the events of the previous movie, but it’s also likely it could be the title of another big Avengers comic arc like Infinity War is. The Russos don’t want us figuring out what happens before it happens, so for now they’re keeping their secrets.

Speaking of secrets, there’s been a fan theory floating around that Avengers 4 is going to feature some sort of time travel, since fans have found pictures from set with Thor in his long blond hair and the return of Agent Peggy Carter. But Joe Russo says it’s not time travel — not exactly:

Certainly, there is a five-minute sequence in Civil War around a piece of technology that was laid in for a very specific reason. If you go back and look at that film, you may get a hint as to the direction.

If you recall, one of the first scenes in Civil War is a de-aged Tony Stark saying goodbye to his parents, which is then revealed to be a holographic projection of Stark’s memories that he’s showing off to an auditorium of MIT students. The B.A.R.F., a.k.a. Binarily Augmented Retro-Framing technology, is, as Stark describes it, “an extremely costly method of hijacking the hippocampus to clear traumatic memories.” In Civil War it was used as a way to hint that the deaths of Stark’s parents came at the hand of the Winter Soldier, but in Avengers 4 could be used more for its intended purpose. Those anachronistic set photos may be an indication that we might see a bunch of scenes of the Avengers using the technology to process some sort of grief. Folks, somebody’s going to die.